With A Calm Mind
by WhatBecomesOfYou
Summary: Jim/Pam. She has to calm her mind before she can move forward. Post-season five finale. Now complete!
1. One: Passing in a Blur

**Author's Note**: _Each chapter is inspired by five prompts from my Jim/Pam claim at 50scenes on LiveJournal. _

_Takes place after the season five finale. I don't own anything._

* * *

She fiddled with her hands as they drove off from the hospital, her ring cool against her heated skin. Somewhere next to her, in her clouded haze, Jim was talking about the excitement of the day, everything that had gone on. "Pam? Are you okay?" he asked, putting one hand over hers and giving her a little smile.

She nodded, nearly imperceptible at first, but growing in vigor. "Yeah, I'm fine," she replied, looking up at him.

"We're going to be _parents_, can you believe it?" His face lit up at the words.

No, no, she couldn't. It didn't seem real. But she didn't need to say _that_.

"I can," she said, mentally berating herself as soon as she said it. Lying to Jim wasn't something she had ever intended to do. Things change, she supposed. Turning away from him, she pressed her nose to the window, and watched as the city streets passed by in a blur.

* * *

They pulled into the parking lot of the grocery store, needing a few things to prepare for dinner that evening. "Is there anything in particular you want?" Jim asked, as they pushed a cart through the aisles, picking out two cans of store-brand peas and putting them in the cart, nestled in next to a small bag of sugar. "I _think_ we have enough pickles and ice cream to last us a while, in case you get a craving in the middle of the night."

She rolled her eyes and groaned, swatting him lightly across the forearm. "No way. I'd _never _do that."

"You say that _now_, Beesly, but if I come out of the bedroom at three in the morning and find you pigging out on a dill pickle and rocky road sundae, don't say I didn't warn you."

"I never said I wouldn't get cravings. But that sundae sounds _disgusting_."

"Just watch...just watch."

* * *

As they pulled their cart up to the checkout, and Jim made small talk with the young, female cashier with the unusually spelled first name, Pam sunk back against the magazine rack, looking up into the blinding fluorescent lights. Next to her, a male Hollywood star smirked out from the cover of a teen magazine, his visage captured in print, to be papered on his adoring audience's walls and kissed with varying shades of lipstick before their bedside lights were turned out for the night. She had once been that girl, many years before. Not anymore. Self-consciously, she rubbed her stomach. She knew she wasn't showing yet, but she knew that, for the next few months, this would be her one link, her one connection to her unborn child. Their unborn child, she mentally corrected herself. _Theirs_.

* * *

After dinner that night, they lay on the couch, her head cradled against his chest, his hands running through her hair, enjoying a peaceful and mutually agreed-on silence. She stretched her arms above her head and smiled over at him.

"You think they know about it?" he asked, breaking the silence, looking over at her. "I mean, I _did_ tell Dwight to send in the subs."

She shook her head and wrinkled her nose. "Nah, probably not. They'll probably think that something was very wrong, and pepper me with a million questions."

"Should we invent some catastrophic medical ailment for you to prevent the interrogation?" he replied with a laugh.

"I went in for _x-rays_. They're _not_ going to think I contracted the pneumonic plague. Besides, you know as well as I do, Dwight would still constantly annoy me about it. Probably would wonder how I contracted it in the first place."

Jim gave a grunt in agreement and they fell back into their silence; their slow, steady breathing being the only noise permeating the room.

* * *

Later that evening, as Jim lay in bed, his gentle snoring filtering out, Pam peered at herself in the bathroom mirror, dabbing absentmindedly with a washcloth. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a fortune from the last time they had gone out to House of China leaning against the mirror. She remembered how Jim had handed her both fortune cookies after their meal, and told her to pick one. The one Jim ended up with had been something about living in interesting times. Wasn't every day at Dunder-Mifflin under the umbrella of "interesting times" though?

She stared at the little slip of paper, the tiny red words blurring together in her line of vision. She knew what she had to do. Funny how those little things could answer the questions that she didn't know she was asking herself. She got up abruptly and walked back into the bedroom, single-mindedly focused on the task ahead. The sudden movement caused the fortune to fall off the edge of the bathroom counter and drift downward, falling onto the tile, fortune side up.

"_Dedicate yourself with a calm mind to the task at hand_."

* * *

-_to be continued_-

**Prompts used in this chapter**: _Hands, sugar, smirk, silence, and fortune, in that order._


	2. Two: Stars Over the Susquehanna

**Author's Note**: _Thank you for all of the reviews on chapter one. Here's chapter two._

* * *

She drove most of the night, stopping occasionally for food and other necessary things, a small overnight suitcase sitting in the passenger seat next to her. Her first thought had been to go to her mother, talk things out over blueberry pancakes and maple syrup. That wouldn't have been a good idea, she thought to herself. Maybe she could, in a bit, let herself cool down a bit, before she dropped a bombshell on her mother. Discretion was always a good thing.

Glancing over at the road signs on the side of the road, she let out a sigh. She was nearing Harrisburg, over two hours from home. She'd stop there for the night, get some sleep in a cheap motel room and decide what to do when the sun came up. She could continue driving south, hit Baltimore and then Washington DC or she could go west…or east…or drive back home, pretend like she had just gone out for a drive around the block. "Yeah, Pam, a drive around the block…with two changes of clothes and a toothbrush," she muttered to herself, willing herself not to cry. She had had to get away and think about things without Jim being around, even though she _knew_ he understood and was excited about the baby, but the revelation was cutting deep. It was a big step, an irreversible life change.

Bitter, salty tears splashed on the steering wheel, as she let out the caged tears. It felt good to cry, a simple, primal release of excess emotion. It was what she needed.

* * *

The stars over the Susquehanna River glimmered brightly as she pulled into town, and found a cheap motel room. Settling down onto the bed, she grimaced. The bed was lumpy, the fabric of the comforter was frayed, and the air conditioner was broken, creating a sauna-like atmosphere in the room. She fanned herself with a brochure for a local amusement park the concierge had handed her, as she flopped back onto the pillows and squeezed her eyes closed, not bothering to change out of her clothes from the day before. There'd be time for changing and showers and thinking later. For now, it was time to sleep.

* * *

Jim woke up the next morning and turned over in bed. "Pam?" he whispered, eyes still closed. When there wasn't a reply, he blearily opened them, and saw that there was no one there. Had she gotten up early? It wasn't totally out of the question, come to think of it.

He padded out to the kitchen, still half-asleep. No sign of her in the kitchen. Maybe she had gone out for an early morning walk, or…no, they had been to Weis yesterday. There'd be no need for her to get groceries. Unless she was having a craving, he thought, remembering the sundae teasing he had given her the day before. Maybe she went to get some bizarre fast food breakfast combination or something.

Sitting down at the table, he waited for the coffee maker to finish percolating. He was excited about the pregnancy. Soon there'd be a little Halpert running around, playing in a sandbox full of sand in the backyard in the summer, making snowmen and snow angels in the winter. Yeah, maybe they were doing things slightly untraditionally by not being married first, and _then_ getting pregnant, but there was something to be said for doing things against the norm. It wasn't like their relationship had ever been particularly normal, though. Eschewing the traditional proposal for one in the rain at a gas station being just one of the many instances he could think of.

As he picked up the coffee pot and poured out a cup for himself, he let out a sigh. She'd be back before they had to go to work, _right_?

* * *

The first lights of morning streamed in through the dingy curtain shades of Pam's motel room. She turned over and groaned, arms flailing outward, and she fully expected to whack Jim across the chest. When she hit dead air instead, she frantically opened her eyes and looked around. Memories of the night before came flashing back at her, and she felt a wave of nausea pass through her.

She ran into the bathroom and kneeled over the toilet, avoiding putting her knees on the floor, which she wasn't sure if it had been mopped recently or not, and she retched up the truck stop sandwich she had eaten the night before. Was this morning sickness, or just some bad eggs? She wasn't quite sure, but she made a mental note to read up on things later. A shower would make her feel better, cleaner, and then she could worry about food and maybe contacting Jim, letting him know that she was okay.

She turned on the faucet for the shower, and gingerly leaned back against the counter to let it warm up. "Darn it," she said under her breath, glancing up at the water dribbling out lazily. _Drip_. _Drip_. The shower would have to wait. Rummaging through her purse, she found a hair band. It would have to do, for now.

* * *

Jim walked into the office, quiet except for a few people typing away on their computers. She wasn't at her desk, so that scratched out "_go out to breakfast without waking up your fiancé and then go into work_," on the list of options of what she could be up to, unless she still wasn't at the office yet. Her purse wasn't there, so she hadn't just ducked into the restroom briefly.

Inwardly, he was hoping that she was okay. It wasn't like her to not tell him things, so something had to be going on. He hoped it wasn't anything bad.

He lounged back in his chair and waited for the phone to ring and for her to be on the other end, or, alternately, for her to come through the office door. Either one would work, he wasn't particularly picky about which one...

* * *

-_to be continued_-

**Prompts used**: _Cry, stars, sand, sick, hope, in order._


	3. Three: Most Personal of the Knots

**Author's Note**: _This was written prior to the premiere, so nothing from that is taken into consideration. While future chapters may incorporate parts of season six, as of right now, I don't have any plans to._

* * *

"Where's Pamorama?" Michael asked Jim later that morning, in the typical boisterous manner that would generally lead to shared expressions and stifled laughter between Jim and Pam.

He pointedly averted Michael's inquisitive glances and glanced down at the keyboard, making a mental note to find the keyboard cleaner later. "She's not feeling well," he said, pointedly avoiding the truth. "I told her to stay home and sleep."

"Is she okay?" Phyllis asked, looking over at Jim.

"Yeah. She just needs some rest." Just then, his phone rang, and he put a finger up to effectively silence both Michael and Phyllis. "Dunder-Mifflin, this is Jim..."

* * *

Pam pulled out of the motel parking lot. Breakfast would be nice, since she hadn't chosen a motel the night before based on the existence of free continental breakfast. She drove along the road, looking for a small diner. Food. Food, then call Jim. Let him know that she was okay. Would she go home? No need to make a decision on an empty stomach, and her stomach rumbled then, responding to the unspoken question.

She pulled into a small local diner located down the road. It wasn't often she went out to breakfast, especially without Jim, but times were changing.

Sitting at a small table inside, she glanced at the menu. A part of her wondered how much of this was 'safe' to eat for her. She hadn't even been able to talk to her doctor yet, get a checkup on how the baby was doing. The baby. It sounded so cold and distant. "Baby Halpert," she murmured, deciding on pancakes. Pancakes should be safe.

The waitress brought her a glass of water and smiled. "You ready to order?" she asked, pulling out a notepad.

"Yeah. I am."

* * *

The last time he had felt so alone at work was when he had newly transferred to Stanford. It wasn't that he didn't like his co-workers, because he _did_, it was the uncertainty of the situation with Pam that was making him uneasy and he felt much as though he was an island in a sea of desks.

He got up from his desk and slipped outside, pacing in the parking lot. Every imaginable horror story played out in his head, her being kidnapped in the middle of the night by a masked assailant, her weather-beaten skeleton being found by hikers in the Poconos two years later, but it all came back to her leaving voluntarily _and_ without telling him. Nothing else fit.

"Oh _Pam_," he said, turning around to walk back into the building. Just then, he heard a faint ringing from his pocket. Stopping to answer, he took in a deep breath, and hoped for the best.

* * *

"Halpert." The sturdy familiar voice echoed clear and true over the cell phone connection.

She sat at the picnic table, one overlooking the riverbank, the faint summer wind bristling through the leaves of the trees. "It's me," she said softly, barely above a whisper.

"Beesly, you've had me worried. Where are you? Are you okay? Are you coming home?" The peppering of questions felt never-ending, nearly suffocating. She had to smile though. It was nice to hear his voice.

"We're doing fine," she said, the corner of her mouth crooking into a small smile at her use of the word 'we'. "But we're not coming home yet."

"Why not? We _can't_ deal with this if you aren't here to talk it out."

"Maybe it was a _mistake_ for me to call you," she said, raising her voice slightly, her voice oddly even and calm. "I just wanted you to know I was _safe_."

"Are you in Wilkes-Barre? Still in Scranton? Did you head back to New York City?"

She shook her head even though she knew there was no feasible way for him to see the movement. "No, no, and _no_."

"Then where _are_ you?" It was more insistent, nearly a plea for any scrap of knowledge.

"I'm thinking about everything that's going on right now, Jim. It's peaceful here; it's allowing me to clear my mind. I could draw, if I had my notepad and a pencil."

"When will you be home?"

"I don't _know_. Soon, maybe."

* * *

A short time later, she snapped her phone shut and let out a sigh. Gazing out over the river, she watched the reflection of the morning sun on the water.

The phone call had been good, in a way. It allowed her to talk to Jim, let him know that he wouldn't be seeing her face on the six o'clock news that evening, but also, it was a way to give him the goodbye she had neglected to give him the night before.

She stared idly ahead, fiddling with a loose strand of hair. Nervous habit, she supposed. There were a lot of things to be thinking about. Everything was changing, and if she didn't think it all through, there would be a big Pam-sized splash at the end of it all.

There was no way that everything would be resolved in a day, a week, or even a month away, but she figured, if the most personal of the knots could be untangled, then she could face the rest hand-in-hand with Jim.

* * *

-_to be continued_-

**Prompts Used**: _Sleep, glass, alone, mistake, sun, in order._


	4. Four: Golden Sun, Silver Moon

Jim looked down at the phone, gasping slightly for air as he stared at the receiver. What had just gone on? He never thought Pam would be like this, not toward him. She was all "let me calm down and rationalize this," and he didn't want her to do that. Not alone. He wanted her to be in Scranton, with him, and they could work any issues that she had out -_ together_.

It did take two people to make a baby, after all. And it was beautiful, and it would be the best thing that either of them had ever done. Well, he thought with a bitter smile, the best thing he had ever done was stay by her side through thick and thin, which was apparently too much for her to reciprocate right now.

"Maybe the time apart will do us some good," he thought. "But hopefully she's home soon." He pulled out a sandwich from his desk drawer and bit into it. It tasted like sawdust. The sandwich sat idly in the wrapper for the rest of the day, one large bite taken out of it, until he finally threw it into the trash can at the end of the day.

* * *

A short time after the phone call ended, as the sun hung high in the sky, Pam moved from her picnic table to a nearby bench. Children ran through the grass, happy and carefree, chasing each other, playing tag, throwing balls. It was perfect and idyllic. All that it needed was a batch of paint strokes across her vision and it'd be worthy of hanging in a museum.

She had never been good with children, not even on Take Your Daughter to Work Day. A part of her envied Jim's easygoing nature, the kind that kids gravitated toward. Hell, even adults made friends with Jim Halpert easily. He would be an amazing father, she knew that. It wasn't his parenting skills that she feared. It was her own.

If she wasn't good with children, she rationalized, then how could she be a good mother? She wished she could be. The child growing inside her deserved a good mother, like her own had been. He or she, she wasn't sure which and was honestly not even sure she wanted to know, deserved to have the best of everything available to them. She knew that together, they would be a good set of parents, but with her insecurity, it was nagging at her.

Pam sank back against the bench and watched as a mother comforted her young daughter nearby, just within her earshot. "Addison, it'll be okay," the mother said, gently running her hand over the top of her daughter's hair.

"Those mean boys hit me with the ball," Addison said between hiccups, tears streaking down her cheeks, pointing at two boys playing catch nearby. "I wanna go _home_."

Pam made eye contact with the mother; she saw the way this mother looked at her daughter, love and caring and devotion. "I think that's a good idea," the mother said, taking her daughter's small hand in hers. "Let's go home."

As the mother and daughter walked off toward the parking lot hand-in-hand, Pam got up and stretched her legs. It was long past lunchtime, and she was _starving_.

* * *

That evening, she watched the golden sun set over the river; he watched the silver moon rise over the horizon.

Same sun, same moon, and yet their distance seemed as though it was more than just one hundred miles.

* * *

He made sure the front door was secure, as he did every night, and as he walked away, he stopped. "In case she decides to come back," he said under his breath, flipping the light switch into the on-position, illuminating the foyer.

She turned out the lamp in her motel room, clutching one of the spare pillows closely to her, the feeling of her arms around something a small comfort in her mind.

He laid one of her favorite shirts out on the bed next to him, where she should have been. If she wasn't going to be there, at least he could have some small part of her in his arms, he thought as he fell asleep.

* * *

The questions from well-meaning co-workers were soon becoming too much for Jim, even with his constant reassurances that "Pam's okay, she's just sick."

On Tuesday, Michael suggested that they all cut out of work early and go to Pam and Jim's house to do something about "turning her frown upside down," and something about acrobats and imitating something he saw on YouTube. Wednesday brought Dwight's offer of some beet-based medicines, fresh from Schrute Farms.

He stayed home from work on Thursday to think about his next move. She hadn't called since their conversation on Monday morning, and he was, to be honest with himself, worried about her somewhat.

Signing onto their shared checking account, he saw a score of purchases from recent days. He printed out the account summary, grabbed his car keys, and ran out the door.

If Pam wasn't coming home, he was going to go to where she was. Based on her latest checking account activity, he had a pretty good idea of where to start.

-_to be continued_-

* * *

**Author's Note**: _I abandoned the idea of each chapter having five themes used. Sorry for the long hiatus on this, I'm going to try to wrap it up in the next few chapters and hopefully have it done soon._


	5. Five: Ready Now

After a few hours of driving, Jim pulled into a parking lot to gather his thoughts before making his move. He had the vision in his head of finding out exactly which motel she'd checked into, get the room number from a bored night desk clerk, and knock on her door in some grand motion. She'd be shocked at first, of course, since she'd think that he was still at home, and then they'd speedily reconcile and be back to Scranton before sunrise.

Instead, he took out his cell phone and punched in her speed dial, sucking in a deep breath as he did so. One ring. Two rings. Three rings. He heard a click on the other end. "Hey," he said, exhaling.

"Jim?" Her voice sounded quavery, as though she had been crying - or maybe she was just tired.

"Yeah. It's me.""

"Is everything okay?" He heard a rustling in the background. "It's almost midnight."

"I don't think I'm that far from where you are."

"Oh? You drove _all the way_ down here." She sounded almost incredulous.

"Yes. I did."

"But _why_?"

_That_ was the thousand, million, _billion_ dollar question; in it, hung their entire relationship, their engagement, their _future_. "Can I see you?"

She sighed into the receiver. "Sure. I guess. I'm at the Red Roof Inn off the interstate." She paused, before continuing, "It's room 218."

* * *

Pam snapped her phone shut and eased out of the bed, shuffling over to the easy chair by the door. _Only Jim_. Their communication embargo of the past few days had worn on her, and his voice over the phone was warm and inviting.

Some part of her was almost ready to go home. And yet, as she'd awoken each morning this week, she hadn't even entertained the _thought_ of redirecting her car toward Scranton.

A knock sounded at her door; she looked through the peephole and saw him standing in the sickly light of the hallway, hands folded behind his back.

She wasn't sure what to expect when she opened the door; he enveloped her in a crushing hug, his arms wrapped tightly around her torso, and she could only close her eyes and hope that the tears that were welling up wouldn't betray her now.

* * *

They sat on the bed, Pam sitting where the sheets were crumpled and Jim sitting on the other side, their hands interlinked. "It's good to see you," she said, breaking the silence.

"I came because I _had_ to," he said, answering the question he'd left unanswered on the phone, "because I was worried about you and I love you and I didn't want to be separated from you anymore."

"What's going to happen to us in the future, though?" she asked, gnawing thoughtfully on her bottom lip.

"We'll figure it out when we get there." He grasped her hand tighter and looked at her. "It's natural for first-time parents to be nervous."

"Why aren't you more nervous then?"

"Because I _know_ we'll be amazing, and even if we aren't, our son or daughter is going to look at us like we're the center of their universe, and any small mistakes we make won't matter."

She found herself smiling at his statement. "You're right." She squeezed his hand, feeling some of the tension from the past few days melting away.

"Should we get some sleep, so we can leave in the morning?"

"That sounds like a good idea," she said with a barely stifled yawn, looking at the clock, "seeing as how it's almost two."

* * *

Sunlight peeked through the blinds, and Jim woke up to find that over the course of the night, they had gravitated to a position where she was facing him, their arms wrapped around each other's waists, their legs intertwined, and she was murmuring something about "Jim, _not_ the football," under her breath.

He kissed her forehead and moved one of his hands up from her waist to smooth down her frizzy morning hair. "Good morning," he said.

She opened her eyes. "Good morning," she repeated.

"Sleep well?"

"The best sleep I've had in a while," she said, with a large smile on her face, "but I think I'm ready to go home now."

"Are you sure? We could stay down here for another day or two, if you wanted."

"I'm ready to go home, Jim," she repeated.

"Then, let's go home."

* * *

She looked in her rearview window as they drove along the interstate back to Scranton, him following behind her. He held a thumbs-up out the window, and she honked her horn in return.

She knew she was ready now, and he _had_ been ready, and it was time for them to enter their future - _together_.

-_fini_-

* * *

**Author's Note**: _Not quite two years later, this is finally finished! Thank you so much to everyone who's ever read this, all of the reviewers and people who favorited this and put it on alert - I doubt it would have ever been finished without all of you._


End file.
